Will Smith, Words, Wanton Skewing, and Warning for the New Year

Will Smith invoked the name of Hitler in a sentence to make a point about people being basically good and of course a reporter then goes on to show how wrong he is. It’s not that I wouldn’t like the world to be fully loaded with benevolence and kindness but it just isn’t so. On Christmas Eve, I saw that pillar of objective thought, Newt Gingrich narrate a Fox series on God and the history of this country, that equated to a skewed version of shoving Christianity down the Constitution of the United States as the “only” religion this country was based by quoting Presidents and men of Congress through the years while avoiding the words of the founders of this country. Imagine that, quoting politicians as if there were prophets..profits perhaps. I also watched a debate between a loud Starr Jones and an quiet atheist that missed the entire meaning of the debate as the shouting of rhetoric overwhelmed the other guy’s point of being allowed to practice or not practice “a religion” in this country. I’m not going to tell or insinuate anyone is less intelligent, more intelligent, or more worthy of a hereafter because they practice a certain faith, be it one that has bishops and claims higher legitimacy than any other, or practices Buddhism as a lifestyle, however my take on all of this bitterness of politically correctness is that kindness is very much lacking in all of us, especially those who preach and protest the most.

Are the gifts at Christmas the best we can offer to show that we care about each other? Is that the common denominator for the shards of what we have left, of the kind of morality your great-grandmother used to teach but is now long-gone? Why is there so much greed and hysteria in the world today? Much of it comes from “me, my, mine” and that includes religion’s mantra of conversion or death-my God is the only God and the war begins. If you read only conservative orthodox religious books you don’t have much of a background of actual history do you? If you watch or listen only to right or left wing television or radio shows, you don’t have much of a point of view from any other reference do you?

Exclusionary beliefs are what brings humanity to bloodshed and always has with millions of deaths in the name of God and/or State, but we learn little as the ages go by. Our extinction is entirely possible and I believe probable, if we don’t wake up and begin practicing random acts of kindness throughout our lives, regardless of one’s faith. We all have those dark forces within us, but the goodness is there, it just has to be nurtured and brought into the light of day, and practiced over and over to be effective. If we do not heed the warnings of those who allow what seems harmless to become harmful, then we become the evil that is within us and are no better.